THROUGH
SAVAGE EUROPE
BEING THE NARRATIVE OF A JOURNEY
(UNDERTAKEN AS SPECIAL CORRE-
SPONDENT OF THE "WESTMINSTER
GAZETTE"), THROUGHOUT THE BAL-
KAN STATES AND EUROPEAN RUSSIA
BY
HARRY DE WINDT, F.R.G.S.
AUTHOR OF "THE NEW SIBERIA," "A RIDE TO INDIA,"
"FROM PARIS TO NEW YORK BY LAND," ETC.
WITH ONE HUNDRED ILLUSTRATIONS
LONDON
T. FISHER UNWIN
ADELPHI TERRACE
MCMVII
CHAPTER XX
THE RED FLAG IN RUSSIA (continued)
A RIOT IN WARSAW
CRASH ! Bang ! Smash ! I awaken with a start
to my surroundings in a luxurious bedroom, all
rosy chintz, and white and gold furniture, and
wonder whether a violent earthquake has shaken
the world, for the whole massive building seems
to tremble, for a few seconds, under the shock
of the ^concussion. But almost simultaneously
a German waiter enters, cool and imperturbable,
with the morning roll and caf6 au lait.
"Another bomb, Monsieur," he remarks, as
unconcernedly as though he were criticising the
weather. "It sounds as if this one were in the
Jewish quarter that makes the third this week,
and there will probably be some more to-day ! "
I had arrived in Warsaw the previous evening
to find the city in a state of ferment and the
wildest rumours abroad. Even at Kieff the mail-
cart had been brought to the train by a heavy
escort of cavalry, and I had found the railway
station here surrounded by troops. One- third
of our train had been composed of prison cars
occupied by a regiment of the line under orders
for this place. Everything looked as if a row
was imminent, and before many hours were
over.
"They say there are two thousand bombs in
the city ! " was my greeting from the gold-laced
porter at the Hotel Bristol, the gilded and usually
crowded halls of which I found deserted save by
a few Press correspondents and business men
and even these wore an air of apprehensive unrest.
" Anything may happen to-morrow a public holi-
day," said the editor of a leading Warsaw journal,
" but there will be no bloodshed if it can possibly
be avoided." But he added that the most trifling
incident in the crowd a chance word or blow
might lead to scenes of slaughter too terrible to
contemplate. For on the Sunday preceding the
massacres there were all the makings of a row
on both sides the soldiers were sulky at having
to patrol the hot, dusty streets on a day of rest ;
the people were goaded into an irritable frame of
mind by vexatious police restrictions and the
wholesale arrests which had recently occurred
here and at Lodz.
Moreover, the sudden arrival
of three regiments of Don Cossacks was not cal-
culated to mend matters, for these gentlemen are
less handy with smooth words than the nagaika.
It was reported that the Governor-General had
issued strict orders that shot and steel were only
to be used as a means of defence and as an
absolutely last resource. This may, or may not,
have been correct. Anyway, twelve rounds of
ball cartridge were issued to each man, and it
is calculated that on the fatal day there were
no fewer than sixty thousand troops under arms
in and around the city. It is true, an ukase
of the Tsar proclaiming religious tolerance had
arrived that morning, but most people regarded
it as a mere artifice to quiet the people and tide
over this critical time, which it probably was.
The bomb explosion, which occurred at six
o'clock on that bright May morning, was
quickly followed by the clatter of cavalry and
tramp of troops on the wood pavement, and this
continued unceasingly throughout the whole of
that day and the following night. I rose, and
dressed quickly, during which operation two
policemen entered my room, and without a word
of excuse or explanation closed the shutters. In
the entrance hall I was agreeably surprised to
find an old friend Stanhope, of the New York
Herald and we set out together, while there
was yet time, for the telegraph office, a report
having just come in that the Town Hall would
surely be wrecked by dynamite at midday. It
was now only 8 a.m.
The military display was in itself worth the
journey from London to witness, and the blue
sky and dazzling sunshine, church bells, regimental
music, and spectacular appearance of thousands
of glittering uniforms, ever on the move, was
anything but suggestive of the ghastly tragedies
which were so soon to follow. Indeed, the only
sombre figures in that brilliant assemblage were
Jews of the hideous Polish type, with rusty black
skirts and corkscrew ringlets, who wandered aim-
lessly through the crowd with a look of nervous
expectation on their pale, crafty faces.
Up till
10 a.m. street cars and cabs were running ; after
that hour the streets resembled a desert, although
either pavement of the Krakovskaya, or principal
thoroughfare, was densely crowded with people
whose anxious looks contrasted oddly with their
gay holiday attire. About eleven o'clock some
workmen overturned a droshki, the driver of which
had been bribed to convey a fare to the railway
station. Both men were rather severely handled,
but nothing of further importance occurred.
Every courtyard in the principal streets was now
occupied by the soldiery. At noon congregations
left the churches to swell the multitudes on the
Krakovskaya. Warsaw was now like a beleaguered
city. Not a meal was to be had for love or money
save at a certain French restaurant, where
Stanhope and I were taken by the American
Consul to clandestinely partake of breakfast under
the anxious eye of the trembling proprietor, whose
house would have been promptly attacked had the
fact transpired. Then I returned to the Moskov-
skaya, where bodies of troops were still moving
ever on the march chiefly dense masses of men in
the hideous grey coats of the Russian line, relieved
by occasional glimpses of colour as a squadron of
lancers or the Grodno hussars, in their smart
green tunics and magenta overalls, came clattering
by. And all this while the crowd looked on in
silent and sulky apathy, although the Don Cossacks,
armed with whips and mounted on their shaggy
ponies, occasionally called forth uncomplimentary
remarks.
Near the Hotel Bristol a street boy's
facetiousness went too far, and like lightning a
swarthy ruffian reined up, and I saw the lad jump
in the air with a shrill scream of pain as the
cruel nagaika curled round his body with a crack
like a pistol-shot. Had this occurred in the poorer
quarters of the city the man would have been torn
to pieces.
The heat was terrific, and early in the afternoon
I returned to the hotel for a few minutes' rest
in the cool marble lounge of the " Bristol." Some
cavalry officers had come in from the sweltering,
dusty streets, for the same purpose, and one of
them was showing an empty bomb, taken by the
police on the previous night, to his comrades.
These infernal machines were facetiously termed
Mandarines in Warsaw, but their shape in no-
wise resembled an orange. The one I handled
was about six inches long and four in diameter,
with a thin paper partition in the centre dividing
two compartments one of which, when charged,
contained muriatic acid, and the other nitro-
glycerine. In the latter a leaden ball was placed, so
that when the missile was thrown with violence and
struck the ground at either end, the ball broke
through the paper, the chemicals met, and an
explosion ensued. The cost of each was about 15
roubles or 10s. and ten thousand were said to
have been distributed for use throughout Warsaw,
but subsequent events proved this report to be
grossly exaggerated.
The time was now drawing near for the monster
demonstration which, consisting of thirty thousand
men, was announced to start from the poorer
quarters at 4 p.m., parade several parts of the
city, and finally march past the Governor's palace
and down the Krakovskaya. But the hours went
by and not a soul appeared. My only means of
obtaining information was through my friend
the Russian editor, who sat in his office throughout
the day watching events in Warsaw and meta-
phorically feeling the revolutionary pulse of Lodz
by telephone.
About 3 p.m. he passed me, white
and breathless, in the street, crying out that
important news had come at last. A fight had
occurred in the Jerusalemski Street, near the
Vienna Railway Station fifty already reported
killed and wounded, women and men. It took me
quite half an hour to reach the place in question
through a struggling, panic-stricken mob, but here
I found a compact wall of infantry blocking up
the thoroughfare as far as the eye could see.
What happened here will never be known ; but
it is safe to assume that in the Jerusalemski
affair at least sixty people were killed on the spot.
At any rate, it was officially announced that over
a score of wounded succumbed in the hospitals
next day. This riot is said to have been started
by a shot fired into the troops from a window,
but it is just as likely that this body of workmen
were carrying red flags (which had been strictly
forbidden) and that this provoked a military
attack.
From this time indiscriminate murder was let
loose, and news of fresh conflicts and disasters
kept coming in every hour. At six o'clock about
twenty students and workmen (and two or three
women) were shot down in the Sosnovaulitza.
From Praga (a suburb just across the Vistula) we
learnt, at seven o'clock, that men, women, and
children had been shot down en masse by the
Lithuanian Regiment. Here over thirty-six
people are said to have been killed, most of them
poor, harmless beings who had idly strolled out
to witness, and not join in, the manifestation.
These were the two principal encounters of the
day, but there is no doubt that many others
occurred in the various suburbs, and that the
official report of the casualties issued by the
authorities were far below the actual figures.
Warsaw is a large city, and posted, as most of
us were, on the Krakovskaya, it was impossible to
know what was going on in the suburbs. But it
is a significant fact that, although the Krakovskaya
was specially selected by the various Socialist
committees for their most important parade, not
a single workman appeared all day near the street
in question ! Couple this with the fact that sixty
thousand troops (to say nothing of police) were
engaged in maintaining order all over Warsaw
and its outskirts, and I fancy the Govern-
ment reports as to the number of killed and
wounded that day in Warsaw may safely be dis-
credited.
The Praga business over, there was a lull, at any
rate in the Krakovskaya, which was now cleared
of civilians and solely occupied by ambulance
carts, squadrons of cavalry, and Cossacks. Occa-
sionally the latter would gallop wildly off, with
unearthly yells and a cracking of whips, and we
knew that more bloodshed would shortly be in
progress. But all that day the most level-headed
people were in a state of doubt and nervous
excitement, and it was difficult to substantiate
the wild reports which kept pouring in from all
parts of the city.
From eight o'clock until ten in the evening
there was little doing, and I strolled down the
street to the Governor's palace, which I found
surrounded by Cossacks seated around their
camp fires. But approaching too near the build-
ing, I was quickly covered with a rifle and
ordered to clear out, which I did, fully expecting
to be followed by half an ounce of lead, for many
people were shot that night on the flimsiest pretext.
We were wondering at the " Bristol " what had
become of all the threatened bombs, when one
of the latter burst in a street close by, killing
three Cossacks and a policeman. And this, so
far as I know, was the final tragedy of the day,
and occurred at about half-past ten in the
evening.
Towards midnight the streets were quiet and
deserted but for the eternal challenge of sentries
and tramp of armed men. While smoking a cigar
in the moonlit street outside the hotel, a rumble of
wheels was heard on the wood pavement, and a
rough country cart appeared, drawn by an old
white horse and escorted by soldiers with fixed
bayonets. " Some of the dead from Praga," said
a man beside me, and curiosity impelled me to
follow the weird cortege into the courtyard of a
low, yellow building the police office across the
street, where it was halted by the corporal in
charge. A rouble to the latter enabled me to
examine the vehicle more closely also its mys-
terious contents : a shapeless, bulging burthen,
secured by ropes stretched over a coarse tarpaulin.
There were four bodies three men and a woman
huddled together in wet and dirty straw : one a
smooth-faced student in grey uniform, the others
two respectably dressed men perhaps artisans.
Presently the flickering lantern revealed the
woman a girl of about sixteen, slim and fair-
haired.
" She was pretty," says the corporal, as
the frail little body is carried past us in its white
serge dress with mauve ribbons now discoloured
at the throat and wrists. Shot through the
heart ! Ye gods ! What can such a child as this
have had to do with politics? The corporal guessed
my thoughts. " Poor little thing," he muttered,
not unkindly ; "I saw it done, but it was an acci-
dent ! They got her in the back while she was
running away. Heaven rest her soul ! "
The mortuary was one hurriedly improvised
for the occasion underground and lit by an
electric lamp suspended from the rafters, and here
the dead lay side by side in semi-darkness and an
unspeakably foul atmosphere, notwithstanding the
carbolic acid which had been freely sprinkled
about the floor. Men and women lay almost
over one another in the confined space, dressed
in the clothes in which they had met their end a
few hours before, but both sexes were stripped to
the waist, their upper garments being rolled across
the hips. Some were shockingly disfigured, having
been clubbed to death with the butt ends of rifles,
but many of the women who had been shot in the
back while trying to reach a place of safety had no
visible wounds.
The victims appeared to be chiefly
poor people, and only a few were of the upper
class one of them a woman, who had evidently
put on her smartest clothes and jewelry for the
festive occasion destined to end so tragically.
The work of identification was to take place early
the next morning, but by this time I had seen
horrors enough, and had no desire to attend that
harrowing ordeal. I have had to witness other
ghastly scenes in the darkest recesses of the Tsar's
great Empire, but the recollection of that dark
cellar, with its rows of upturned staring faces, will
haunt me to my dying day.
